Churchhoney

Yeah. Remember how Bin and Anna had families once?

Wow, yet another would-be minister. At this point, though, can this one, too, be hoping that the Duggar connection will ease his path into a good pulpit? Hard to see how. Maybe he actually likes Jinger? ... But he's listed as a "friend' of Bin and Jessa. How could he be if he has an IQ over 75? So many questions. This may be the only family in the world in which being unemployed and/or unemployable gets you a super-quick green light to become engaged to their children.

And they sent him to private school ... Wonder what he'd say about his father if he'd let a dozen people live in a small three-bedroom house with one bathroom while he spent a quarter million bucks on a vanity campaign for a U.S. Senate seat that virtually everyone agreed he was unqualified for and didn't have a chance in hell of winning. Hmmm....

I agree that he doesn't have the thought processes to make a good preacher. .... But it's also true that his university wasn't educating him to be a preacher, as far as they knew, so I don't think we can necessarily blame them. They were educating him to be an accountant, mostly. I have to say that I'm still not sure he's a whole lot worse than the average, even among preachers, though. I just heard a sermon a couple of Sundays ago -- first one I've heard in a while. And it was from the head pastor at a large and very popular church, too, recently actively recruited from several states away, a guy in his 40s, with significant experience. But it seemed to me every bit as rambly and pointless as Derick's creations. This one rambled around, covered the same ground over and over, was -- or at least seemed -- quite long, and yet never made more than one point that I could discern. Worse, it never actually explained that point or made it at all clear to me. When the guy was done, I had absolutely no idea what it would actually mean to do what he was exhorting us to do and I didn't even know how he got that particular exhortation out of the text he was supposedly preaching on. There was no reasoning in the sermon that I could discern and absolutely nothing concrete. The guy did get all fired up a few times, though, so I expect that in that, at least, he would come out ahead of Derick as a speaker. Since I didn't know what he was driving at, though, I wasn't too moved by his being fired up. Luckily for everybody, though, I doubt that Derick's going to get his preacher dream. And hopefully even his preaching as a "missionary" won't persist for too long. ... Or he'll get better, maybe? Unlikely, I suppose.

I don't like insulting the places people live, but Oklahoma and education ... well ... http://www.tulsaworld.com/news/education/oklahoma-ranks-th-in-education-week-s-annual-education-quality/article_a576531c-a659-53e0-8e41-9e1fad8e5155.html "Oklahoma finishes 48th with a D+ grade in Education Week’s annual rankings." They probably do have certain basic English requirements, though. And honestly, Derick writes as well as most Americans, as far as I can see. And especially when your whole school system is lagging, most are going to let somebody with his level of ability get by with a pass, since there are many many people in way worse position -- most of whom probably can't do math either, while he can -- to worry about helping. The snarking on this forum about Derick's writing comes from people with, as far as I can tell, way way way above average writing abilities and written-word snobbery.

This is one of the things I really really hate about their being on television. As if being Gothard didn't do enough to force those kids to kind of unconsciously accept the utter falsification of their lives, having the tv show to pimp adds to the required falsification a hundredfold. Nobody who has accepted as normal behavior the putting up of constant false fronts and false images to serve some external purpose is ever ever going to be a mentally healthy or a happy person, in my opinion. I find it appalling that 19 kids and counting on have been indoctrinated into the belief that this is a good and necessary practice.

I think "wrong," unfortunately.

Embryonic and adult stem cells don't work the same, though. Embyronic ones can potentially be used for many many more things. They have the potential to become any kind of cell in the body. Adult ones, by contrast, have the potential to become only certain kinds of tissue. In treatment for the liquid cancers, you're basically just using someone else's stem cells of the kind that make the blood to replace your own bloodmaking stem cells that have been destroyed, sometimes by the cancer but inevitably by the very high-dose chemotherapy those cancers are treated with. There is a point beyond which NHL patients can't have some of their own stem cells extracted to protect them from chemotherapy and then be replaced once the chemotherapy is over, but I guess Cathy had not passed that point. When she described her diagnosis as stage four with a bunch of metastasizing, I would have thought that she had passed that point, but if she said that her whole treatment involved only her own cells, I guess she hadn't. So instead of having someone else's adult stem cells put in to make blood for her in the future, it looks like she just had some of her own stem cells extracted and then returned.

True. But I'm thinking he might be marginally better at it than Bin .... ; ) I'm guessing they both sought out Duggars to marry at least partly because they figured it'd give 'em a leg up on their preacher dreams. Guess they knew they were going to need help with that. ....

The scary thing to me is that I'm betting she -- along with most, if not all, the other kids -- actually believes that the stuff in that letter is true. Because they've been told over and over and over that it is and sent to eternal indoctrinating "family camps" and "family-integrated churches" created for the sole purpose of preventing children's individual development as maturing beings with souls of their own separate from their patriarchs'. And because they've been so isolated and brainwashed that they have no idea at all what it would actually mean to have a parent who actually does, for example, encourage children to pursue areas in which they're individually gifted, let them be creative, take their opinions into consideration when making decisions. And, in particular, because they have no idea what it is to have parent who does not encourage children to Internet-post "father's day" messages that aren't father's day messages at all -- which go to the father, not the public -- but are, in fact, no more than fucking corporate PR. Just like all their parents' "birthday messages" to them. I say this with confidence because I know how completely shocked and astonished I was by millions of perfectly normal family behaviors that I saw for the first time when I was 18-and-over and finally spent time in the homes of families not my own. The Duggar kids have no real idea that their parents are evil and insane. Even if any of them suspect it, they can't possibly grasp the reality of it, and, despite her reputation for being "the rebel," I think that, in some fundamental ways, Jessa is actually a prime double-downer and Kool-Aid drinker. Her stubbornness makes her want to believe what she's always been told because she's always been told that she's one of a very special brood and enterprise. ..... Yeah, they're "special" all right.

I'm picturing a TLC exec phoning Bin immediately upon hearing this pronouncement and begging him, for the love of Duggar, to spill more, much more, about his sins. "Please, think of your family, Bin. We're desperate for a storyline."

Not to mention his barnstorming the country hectoring others about their sexual morality at the same time as he perpetrated scandal number two (and had still failed to make any amends or seek any counseling for scandal number one). If he (and his parents) weren't such loudmouthed hypocritical preachy prick(s) through it all, I expect people wouldn't still be raging this far after the fact.

The thing is, though, the "adults" here were brought up in mid-America, big-time redneck country in an era when "convenience foods" were the be-all and end-all of American living, perhaps especially among the people who were only first or second generation in moving away from the farm-and/or-huge-garden-to-feed-us way of life. So that's not only what they're used to cooking it's what they're used to eating. I don't doubt a bit that those foods are the things that taste far and away the best to them, besides feeling more familiar as kitchen items. That's just the way it is. Those were the foods of their childhoods and they taste like home and hearth to them, I'm sure. Plus, in the days of their childhoods and in small towns and suburbs (as opposed to cities), the cans-and-convenience-foods route was generally looked on as the upwardly mobile way to live -- differentiating you from the rural poor who still had to grub in their gardens for eats. These are not educated people or thoughtful people or, really, rich people (despite TLC) or health enthusiasts or adventurous livers or any of the other kinds of people who grow up with cans 'n' convenience but then have a natural bent to look another way for food. I expect they're eating pretty much the way everyone around them and everyone they know eats, too. It mainly looks different and outrageous to many of us, I expect, because they have the million children. With that volume of children to feed and nourish, the absurdity of doing it with frozen lasagna, tater tots and green-bean casserole becomes obvious (at least to food snobs like a lot of us). But I would bet that the Duggars' cooking and eating habits are pretty standard among their own crowd and neighbors. Americans don't have a centuries old tradition of daily shopping in fresh-food markets and more than we'd imagine don't know what broccoli or lentils are. (and many of those who know what they are definitely won't eat them)

It's definitely peanuts compared to anything scripted, of course. In addition to those lead actors, you don't have bit players, sets to build, costumes to create, remote locations to set up and get permissions for, real writers and directors and directors of photography and lighting and sound and casting and so on to pay and pay for, just to name a few things ..... I would bet the secret, though, is just the timidity of the entertainment industry. I'm sure that if TLC thought they had a show that would be as cheap to produce as Duggardumb and would pull in as big an audience, they'd go for it and drop them. But they have years worth of evidence that the Duggars are the biggest audience draw they've ever had, and no evidence -- I would guess -- that another show they might think of would do as well. Like the whole entertainment industry, these days, they're skeered that something new won't bring in enough cash. So they're willing to just hold on and bring in the eyeballs they can bring in with the Ds, until the Duggar ratings drop down and down and down to the point that they believe that some new idea they have could do just as well. At some point, the Duggar money curve will cross what they actually do believe they can get out of a new show and they'll dump them. That's my hypothesis anyway.

His way of separating himself from his nutball 'rents is first to take a job with their enterprises and then to get a reality tv show? Yeah, that's real separation from JB and M, all right -- so very different from everything he's had modeled for him. Plus, so realistic and responsible. Yeesh. I wonder which insider passed along this ridiculous tale and brilliant analysis. Do Amy and drunken hubby sit around dreaming these things up or is somebody else also feeding the bottom-feeding websites? Maybe Sierra has picked up tabloid talespinning as a side hustle?

Yeah, good point. They do make a big deal out of that. But then they set Josie apart a lot -- both because she's focused as a singleton in a lot of places and because she's conspicuous by her absence in others, such as here. Pretty clear that she's regarded in a different light -- or maybe more than one different light, actually ....

'Kynzie?

He has confused the notes that you scribble down when you're in the very first fledgling way-early barely dawning milliseconds of thinking about something with a sermon you'll force others to sit through or a final class project you'll present for a grade (or whatever the heck this thing is). Just like the rest of them, he's not only an idiot but a lazy idiot. Unfortunately, I'm afraid I could see some teeny church or would-be church somewhere giving him work in hopes that his being Duggar-adjacent would pull in attendees. Fortunately, I can't see any institution of more significance and reach hiring him. Because surely there are better candidates. I hope I'm right because I can't stand to see the lazy idiocy of any of them being further rewarded.

...with all their knees blacked out.

One of life's tragedies is the fact that God -- especially Jesus -- is the con artist's and grifter's best friend. Among these chickenshit "Christians" we obsessively write about, think how many are running the long con.

Probably a big screen for the spy cams.

When you have no sense, you make no sense, I guess.

It's Gospel. You can read all about it in the Book of Marks.

Sorry. I was making a joke that obviously flopped. Kokapetl (I think) joked that the two kids in the picture were actually Jill and Derick (since the caption said that Joy was visiting them) and that they'd really changed. And then I tried (and failed) to joke that not only had they changed into young kids but they seem to have changed into Catholics, with school uniforms and all. When you have to explain your joke, it was a very poor and unsuccessful joke! As for your point -- interesting information! And seems like a very good practice to me.

Cause they still actually support him, but now they're lying about it? Cuz it seems to be getting less socially acceptable and might hurt their cd sales, tv-audience appeal, etc.? Oh, yeah, sure. They've scrutinized his actions and values and their own and they now conclude that these just don't jibe....Uh-huh. Because that's the kind of thing they do. Not. Just sayin.